Chauncey Billups: 'I am a leader' - 10/31/06 - The Detroit News Online Chauncey Billups noticed something was odd and maybe a little off with Carlos Delfino early during training camp. His body language and overall demeanor was bad, droopy, like he was either mad about something or just not having any fun. Billups gave it a couple weeks. Then, not seeing any improvement, he decided to intervene. He and a couple other veterans took Delfino out to dinner one night last week. Billups got right to the point. He asked Delfino, simply, "Are you with us or not?" Billups told Delfino the team was counting on him this season and if he didn't want to be here, speak up now. After Delfino assured him he did want to be here, Billups told him to start acting like it. Whatever it is that's been bothering you, Billups said, let it go. It's not important. We've all gone through stuff in our careers. All that matters now is we need you with us. We need you to be a part of what we're trying to accomplish this season. We have to be able to trust you are with us. President Joe Dumars and coach Flip Saunders could have said those same words to Delfino without having nearly the same effect. Once Billups reached out to Delfino, the change was almost immediate. Delfino began smiling more at practice. He made himself more available to his teammates, even allowing himself to get mixed up in some of Rasheed Wallace's high jinks. Delfino and Lindsey Hunter started their own postpractice shooting regimen. Delfino, for now, is back in the fold.
I'm a huge Delfino fan and I'm glad that Chauncey reached out and showed some love to my guy. It has to be frustrating to be talented and be on a team that's pretty deep and all you want to do is play ball. Carlos doesn't speak English that well and it must be sort of lonely not to have anyone to pal around with. If he's putting in extra shooting practice with Lindsey it showed tonight, his 3 balls looked great. Now if the team as a whole would learn to play some defense without Ben Wallace that would really make me happy.
Looks like it worked Carlos looked confident out there tonight. CB needs to give that speech to the whole crew though because the team didn't show up.
This was pretty cool. I read this post my "we need leadership" post. It is unfortunate that this didn't translate into a win for Detroit.
The extended PR department. You would think a private discussion between players wouldn't become fodder for the news unless a player purposely gave it up. And why would they do that, unless it served their end?
mistake ------------------------- As for CB selling/promoting his leadership skills, BS, CB is for real. Others may have seen this too. So he told them. Do you want to step on that too because it's a contract year?
Ah yes. It was ok when people stepped on Ben, but now that CB is under the microscope for a contract, it's not so funny is it? Nice to see you around TFD. But don't hug too hard on #1. Your heart might get broke. ;)
How about "De let u play der !!!" ? Magic fans on their boards have inquired about Delfino a few times. Since Detroit hasn't used him the past two years, they had interest. If we aren't gonna play Delfino, then I'm all for letting him go to an up and coming team like the Magic. I still can't believe that Flip Murray is that much more impressive that he deserves more minutes than Delfino. Flip is STILL a CRACKHEAD.
How come when I see Jackattaq's name I know it's gonna be something negative... If it's all bad then watch something else. btw, last I checked Delfino was getting minutes and doing a pretty good job.
the problem is that Flip Murray is getting almost double the minutes and playing like crap... Their minutes should be swapped. Flip will have a great game scoring here and there, and do nothing to help you the rest of the time. Delfino can at least bring defense and rebounding when he isn't scoring. We'll see though. We're only 2 games in to the season, but I don't like how things are looking regarding Delfino (and Maxiell).
